Psychometrics are not just being used as a recruitment tool, as Olivia
Goldhill discovers

No matter how rigorous the interview, recruiting new employees can often feel like a game of chance.

Oxbridge stars are outshone by school dropouts, and charming interview candidates can turn into argumentative team members.

To counter these risks, psychological measurement tests — known as psychometrics — are used increasingly to evaluate employees’ strengths and provide insight into their natural skills.

One provider of these is Thomas International, whose Personal Profile Analysis tests (or PPAs) are used by 5,000 UK businesses and 123 schools. The business plans to start working in sport this summer, to ensure the perfect pairing between athletes and their coaches.

But it is difficult to judge a psychometric test without taking one so, with Thomas International’s PPA lasting just seven minutes, I volunteer to bare my working soul.

Before the test, I had strong doubts that a multiple-choice quiz could shine any light on my complex inner psyche.

Seven minutes and one report later, I don’t seem so inscrutable after all.

The PPA itself was an underwhelming experience, made up of 24 questions that asked me to choose which of four adjectives most and least describe my behaviour in the workplace.

One question asked me to choose between good mixer, cultured, vigorous and lenient, while another included jovial, precise, courageous and even-tempered.

As any one of these adjectives could apply to me in different situations, I soon ended up clicking through rapidly without giving my answers much thought.

I did not expect to receive a seven-page report, with a more accurate and insightful portrayal of my behaviour than my own mother could give.

In short, my profile showed somewhat contradictory strengths of dominance and compliance. This means that I have an assertive drive but perfectionist need for accuracy – which can cause anxiety as I push to do more but get trapped in the details.

Martin Reed, chief executive of Thomas International, panders to my sense of uniqueness with news that only 5pc of the population have a similar profile, but says there is no such thing as a good or bad result, as it is just a matter of fitting the right person to the right job.

Thankfully, my profile is a perfect match for journalism – right down to a suspicious distrust of what I’m told.

My family and colleagues confirm that the report rings true but I ask Mr Reed if there is any similarity to horoscope readings, where everyone finds an aspect of themselves in the results.

“No, absolutely not”, he says. “There are more than 1.6bn variations within the reporting and each report is hand-crafted from all those combinations to create an assessment that fits you.”

The assessment is based on the work of 1920s psychologist William Marston, the creator of the lie detector, and evaluates dominance, steadiness, influence and compliance to determine personality traits.

The test has been researched and modified over the years, and is validated by the British Psychology Society.

Mr Reed explains that it is very difficult to cheat on the test, as results are not based on specific answers but patterns within the responses.

“I could get you take the profile again today and you could answer 21 of the 24 lines differently but yet your profile shape would still read the same,” he says. “There will be four or five questions that you probably would have found very difficult to answer, which is part of the mechanism. We’re looking for consistency and correlations between how you’ve answered questions.”

In April 2012, Thomas International began to apply the success of psychometric tests to schools, working mainly with 14- to 16-year-olds to help prepare for a career.

There are twice as many dominant entrepreneur-types among students as the working-age population, according to Thomas International’s research, but 80pc of young people without qualifications, training or apprenticeships also share these traits.

“Entrepreneurial profiles are typically difficult to manage,” says Mr Reed. “If we don’t change the balance of how we work with those young people, they could end up being in this disenfranchised group.”

This summer, Thomas Sport will launch with the aim of helping athletes excel through greater self-understanding.

“We make sure you put the right coach in the with the right player. Andy Murray was always a great player, but he needed someone like [Ivan] Lendl to break through some of those psychological barriers”, Mr Reed says.

Paralympic rower Naomi Riches is one beneficiary of the test. She won a bronze medal in the Beijing 2008 Paralympics and a gold in the London 2012 games, and Mr Reed says the oarswoman credited a psychometric test with her development. “She said it challenged her and allowed her to focus on her strengths instead of just worrying about her weaknesses.”

The playing field is a very different world from the boardroom, but Mr Reed aims to go further.

“My ambition is to try and change the world,” he says. “We’re just doing that one piece at a time.”